Dark Souls’s world was unformed, shrouded with fog, and under the rule of everlasting dragons. Then came fire, and with it disparity: light and dark, heat and cold, and life and death. With the strength of lords found within the flame, man was able to take the unformed world from the dragons beginning the age of fire. However, it isn’t long before the fires fade, leaving only embers for the living to cling to. Among these living is the accursed Dark Sign that marks them as one of the undead. It is either a sign of prophecy or the mark of something much worse. The player is tasked with reaching two bells with the power of awakening. If you can ring them both, the curse may be lifted, but no one knows for sure since it has never been done. It is with this impossible task that the journey into Dark Souls begins.

Those familiar with Demon's Souls, Dark Souls' predecessor, will feel right at home. Dark Souls takes the previous formula and adds a number of changes to the gameplay. The first big change veterans will discover is the removal of the world and character tendency. It is replaced with Humanity which is much easier to understand and track. Humanity is what is used to kindle bonfires and revive back to a human state. It also affects how often you find items as well as how good those items will be. But you don't want to just store all of your Humanity since it also heals you to full once used and can be traded with a familiar bird for upgrade stones and items. When you die all of the Humanity your character had, which is tracked by a the counter in the top left, and the souls you've collected are dropped and marked with a bloodstain that you must touch in order to gain those precious recourses back.

 

The second notable change among all the rest is the removal of the Nexus which served as the central hub in Demon's Souls. After every boss or death you would have the option of coming back to the Nexus to upgrade, repair, and level up your character in peace. Then, after all is said and done, you could return to various checkpoints along each level and skip all of the hazards you faced before. Those that played Demon's Souls will find a new appreciation for the Nexus as Dark Souls has no central hub. The entire world is connected with different areas to discover and traverse. The creators account for this new world by scattering bonfires for you to rest at in each area. But after resting at a bonfire, all enemies you killed revive right back to where they once were. The question that crossed my mind quite often when exploring new areas was if I was prepared to be "stuck" at a bonfire in the middle of an unexplored area. Each time you die, all enemies revive, and you are sent back to the last bonfire you rested at. So if you spend hours trying to brave the depths of an area to find one of these precious bonfires to rest at, know that there is no fast travel in this game, and you will have to fight your way back out in order to make it back to familiar ground. There are shortcuts littered throughout linking these various areas to one another however. Some you'll come across naturally as you progress through the game. Others are guarded by vicious demons or black knights that can be the equivalent of a boss fight.

Fortunately, combat handles largely the same as it did before except that healing and rolling have become a little more risky. There is a slight lag time at the end of a roll so you can't hop around quite as fast as you could before. And healing with your flask makes you vulnerable for a noticeable amount of time. There is a new jumping attack and roll that have been added to the game. These add new strategies to fights and access to a larger range of areas which helps immerse you into the world even more. However, this leads into the final change, as veterans will discover that their precious grass, the healing item in Demon's Souls, is gone and replaced with an Estus Flask. With this you can heal only a finite number of times before having to make the decision of trudging on or heading back to a bonfire to refill. This number can be increased by offering Humanity to kindle the bonfire and make it stronger. This will increase the amount of Estus Flasks you refill when resting at a bonfire. If you're playing online, anyone who rested at the same bonfire will find themselves with an extra flask or two as well. It should be noted that you can only kindle a bonfire in human form. So if you're going the safe route and playing through as an undead, known as a Hollow, then you'll find yourself in a rough spot more often than not.

 

The game has a reputation for being extremely hard, and it is, but not in the typical way that most games are. Every death you suffer in Dark Souls, with very few exceptions, will be your own fault. You will likely die to one of the black knights as you explore the world. He will see you as you turn the corner and promptly kill you in one swing with his sword. But his positioning is never random. He will be in the same place, and that is what makes this game so rewarding and fun to play. As you die to the various enemies and traps you must take note of where each enemy is located, and how you are dying. In essence throwing yourself into a new area and seeing how you die can be your greatest asset. As you learn the various hazards and enemies that lay in wait, you slowly start to master the area as you traverse it time and time again. Eventually, you will start to fly through areas that were once frustrating or even maddening without as much as a second thought.

When you do die you will find that it wasn't because the game was unfair. Instead it will be because you were either too stubborn (trying to best areas that are far beyond your reach), forgetful (as once you've discovered an enemy or trap they will never be anywhere else), or neglectful (underestimating foes in areas you once bested or not preparing before venturing on). After that it is only a matter of figuring out how to get past the obstacle that is in front of you. You just need to be patient. It is only the total lack of foresight as to what will be thrown at you with each step that makes the game so terrifying at first. But this game only gives its greatest treasures to those who brave the depths time and time again. And believe me they are worth the effort.

 

At the start of the game you have a vast number of character classes to choose from. Don't be scared when picking what you want as you aren't stuck with it through the entire game. As you gain souls, you can level each stat individually. So if you start off as a caster and find that melee combat is more fitting to your style thenall you have to do is start putting points into the appropriate stats. You can easily start off as a pyromancer and end up a burly knight in shining armor with a giant shield and an even bigger sword. There is a kind of point of no return in leveling however. With each stat increase, your soul level will increase which also increases the number of souls required to add 1 to any stat. This includes a 9 to 10 jump and a 29 to 30 jump. My best advice is to choose wisely, but don't be afraid to experiment early on. It won’t be long before you find yourself hungering for 20,000 souls just to get a +1 to a stat.

Black phantoms also make a return from Demon’s Souls. As a Human, this time around, you can invade another living player's game to hunt him down with the aid of the enemies around in hopes to steal some of the humanity they possess. You are only in danger of being invaded when you are in human form, but you can only summon the aid of others when in human form as well. But with the possible aid of two other phantoms the risk is worth taking. Messages are everywhere as players try to help or mislead others as to what may lie ahead or where treasure or shortcuts are located. These messages have a rating system with them. If a message was helpful you can vote it up, and it will linger there for longer and even give the player that left it a slight healing boost. Conversely you can up vote down messages that will inevitably send players to their doom if you wish. So once again each player has a slight role to play in how everyone's game experience will pan out. Although you will die more often, I highly recommend the online option and experience a black phantom invasion, as well as leading one. Helping others out with a boss and summoning aid is a lot of fun. While you can play the game strictly by yourself and summon NPC heroes to help, it’s not the same, and you will be missing out on a very large part of the game. As this game is strangely single player and multiplayer at the same time I find it weird to rate them separately. This was intended to have online interaction, and to skip out on the effort put forth seems like cheating yourself out of content than a separate experience.

 

As far as graphics are concerned, the game is beautiful, almost too much at times. While there is hardly ever a sight you see that can't be explored, sometimes the game gets too bold with its surrounding, causing the framerate to suffer. As an example, you can focus your camera on the crow in Firelink Shrine and see the plume of its feathers. While the details are great, it is just too much at times. This isn't a huge problem as it rarely hinders gameplay, but they could have toned it down in places to make the game run uniformly smooth. But when it does run smooth, it’s like silk. Transitions from areas flow naturally to one another. Combat is solid and responsive giving the players a vast arsenal of weapons, spells, and tactics to combat the various enemies. And the characters you find throughout the world seem like they all play some pivotal role in this world. Some offer subtle hints as to what is hidden in the depths or events that are to occur. Overall the experience feels as real as the world you're in.

 

One of the more glaring differences about Dark Souls is the soundtrack. There is no sound to be heard aside from the actions of your character and the enemies. This creates a wonderfully eerie sense that you are alone. With the silence you will hear a roar from the depths or the clanging of armor as unseen enemies start to hunt you down. Once you enter a boss fight the mood changes drastically. You are met with a short cutscene and a wonderful tune that sets the stage for your battle atop castles or in the dark depths. This gives boss battles a fast-paced adrenaline rush that is great in contrast to the sometimes slow crawl through the dungeons. The voiceovers for the NPCs are very well done. It is worth talking to the NPCs from time to time just to hear what they have to say. Some are quirky, others seem mysterious, and some sound like they have gone completely mad. The only character that sounds out of place with his appearance is a creature that appears on familiar ground much later on in the game.

All in all the game is fantastic. You can lose yourself for hours exploring the vast landscape. And while the game offers little direction, aside from the snide comments of an early NPC, this shouldn’t prevent you from traveling the deadly world. There is a great deal to be found in Dark Souls, and I guarantee that no matter how much you think you've discovered, there is always more to find. It could be a new relationship with a NPC, a new shortcut, a new weapon, or even a different ending to a boss fight. The game is rich with content only available to those willing to spend the time to find them. Some may be tempted to play through with a guide, but I urge you to resist. Make the story of your journey through Dark Souls your own before you pick it dry of all the secrets it has to offer.

If you call yourself a gamer you owe it to yourself to try Dark Souls. It is a rough ride that will leave you battered, bruised, and scarred, but it is worth every minute. If the difficulty makes you unsure of the game, try playing Demon's Souls first. It is almost a tutorial in itself for the majority of the trials you will face in Dark Souls. By comparison Dark Souls is the polished diamond to Demon's Souls’ rough coal. This could be From Software’s masterpiece. I really can't find any real glaring problems with this game other than some frame rate issues and nit picking. Even the weird corpse physics are easily overlooked. This is easily a must have and definitely my game of the year so far.